‘Why Presidential Amnesty Office Is Under Attack’

The management of the Presidential Amnesty Office has revealed that it has uncovered the sources of the on-going orchestrated smeared campaign and protest against it.

The office made this revelation through a press statement signed by its Head, Media and Communications, Owei Lakemfa on Monday in Abuja, while reacting to recent protests believed to have been staged by sponsored youths from the Niger Delta and a former contractor of the office, currently under investigations who wanted to use that as an escape route to escape justice.

The statement said, that the Presidential Amnesty Programme as an interventionist, security programme, designed to ensure peace in the Niger Delta.

There are persistent tendencies by some persons to continue to drag it into patrician politics.

’’Its conviction is that the Presidential Amnesty Office should continue to be run as a non-politically partisan agency, accommodating all shades of opinion and political affiliation.

’’…the wild allegations bordering on character assassination made by a Presidential Amnesty Programme contractor, who also runs a fictitious group and has an outstanding 2012 contract with the Presidential Amnesty Programme for which he collected a fifteen per cent mobilisation fee but has not executed the contract.

’’Since the contract has become the subject of litigation and his allegation of corruption against some officials of the Presidential Amnesty Office are under investigation by an agency, it would prefer to await the outcome of the investigations rather than make comments at this point,” Amnesty Office had advised.

The Management stated that while it is proud of the work it is doing in the interest of the country and would neither be distracted nor intimidated, it commended the efforts of its leadership under the stewardship of the Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta and Coordinator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, Brigadier General Paul Boroh (Rtd) for conducting the affairs of the agency in a professional manner and for his unwavering commitment to sustainable peace and development in the Niger Delta and the country.